Central Park Fire Blamed on Compost

A fire started Friday in a composting area inside Central Park near East 106th Street.

Firefighters brought under control a Central Park brush fire Friday that sent up 20-foot flames and forced the closure of pedestrian paths and park drives, officials said.

The fire broke out at about 2:20 p.m. Friday in a composting area near East 106th Street and Fifth Avenue. Within two hours, fire officials declared a two-alarm blaze, bringing more than 100 firefighters to the scene. After about four hours later, the fire was under control.

The Central Park Conservancy collects and composts organic material in a section of the park known as the Mount, including “the shafts of trees that were knocked down from storms or were removed because they were diseased or hazardous,” the city Parks Department and the conservancy said in a joint statement.

The cause of the fire is not clear, but officials said the dry weather may have played a role. No injuries were reported.

Conservancy staff will continue water the site to “avoid any flare-ups,” the statement said.

On Tuesday, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency in Suffolk County as brush fires there grew into blaze that burned for several days. Wildfires also swept through Staten Island’s Fresh Kills area this week, with high winds and dry conditions making the flames particularly hard to control.

Neil Calvanese, the vice president of operations for the Central Park Conservancy, said the dry winter and virtually rain-free spring have made the environment “kind of like a tinder.”

“A fire can start easily,” he added.

Calvanese said large fires in Central Park have been rare over several decades. “It’s been luxurious the last three years in terms of rain so this is kind of a shock,” he said. “You can’t put enough water on the lawns and plant beds. Hopefully it turns around soon.”